Satellite, Mobile Interests Differ on Sharing in Extended C-band
GENEVA -- Major European administrations pushed for approval of an ITU-R recommendation to spur sharing between International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT), the international standard for advanced wireless communications, and the fixed satellite service (FSS) at 3.4 to 3.6 GHz, according to a submission to an ITU-R satellite group meeting here. Satellite interests say more time is needed to accommodate their concerns. The satellite group meets through Sept. 28.
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The 3.4-3.6 GHz band has a worldwide primary allocation to FSS (space-to-Earth) in the Radio Regulations, Inmarsat said in a submission. Some countries in Europe and Africa allocated the band to the mobile service for IMT on a primary basis, it said. Some Central and South American countries made similar IMT allocations at 3.4-3.5 GHz, the Radio Regulations said. Some Asia-Pacific countries made similar allocations at 3.5-3.6 GHz, it said. The 3.5-3.7 GHz band has primary allocations to mobile, fixed and FSS in the Americas, it said.
The draft recommendation is mature, said Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Portugal, Sweden and Switzerland in a submission to the satellite meeting. Completion of the work has already been postponed several times to account for satellite concerns, the countries said. The satellite and terrestrial working groups may meet during an Oct. 12-19 terrestrial services meeting in India, a document said.
Inmarsat raised concerns about additional filtering to address adjacent channel issues in the 3.4-3.6 GHz band, and certain dynamic spectrum access techniques. The draft recommendation only contains descriptive text for how some of the mitigation techniques could help administrations meet power flux density (PFD) limits at the border of other countries, said a draft letter from the satellite group. The letter proposed including parts of an ITU-R recommendation on methodologies for determining whether an IMT station at a given location operating in the 3400-3600 MHz band would transmit without exceeding the PFD limits.
While some satellite proposals were taken into account, other key arguments and proposals were not, AsiaSat said, referring to a proposed joint meeting before approval of the recommendation and several entire sections where it said no elements of the satellite arguments or proposals were taken into account. The draft document contains no calculation methods and no quantified method that administrations can apply, AsiaSat said. SES World Skies said mitigation techniques lack studies and thus should be in a report.
The working parties may be able to have a joint meeting early next year, AsiaSat said. The recommendation is not related to any WRC-12 agenda item, AsiaSat said. The company said there is no imminent deployment of IMT networks in the 3400-3600 MHz band, so there’s no apparent urgency.